Losing Your Best Friend
by hiei2828
Summary: This was my response to the "Losing your..." prompt in the "The Prompts" community.


Discalimer: I own Nothing

Beta: Phantom 130 5

You never quite realize what you have until it's gone. This cliché line has been used time and again in Romance novels, and stories that express loss. I never gave these works a second thought before that day. I wondered around safe in the security that the stalwarts in my life would remain, and nothing and no one could rip the safety net I had built for myself. I found that I was wrong; there was a person who was able to shatter my routine existence. That person was me.

I never would have thought I would be the one responsible for the death of my best friend, though I should have seen it coming. I was self-absorbed, so focused on my mission and my task that I never paid an ounce of attention to the repercussions of my actions. I went from mission to mission focused on the objective, never thinking about how my actions affected the people involved. Never even viewing those involved as people. I saw them as tools, paws in a grander game. On the day I put the mission above my team, viewed my team as chess pieces; on this day, I lost my best friend, and gained a reminder of the sacrifice he was willing to make and the error of my ways.

On this day, every year, I remember the faithfulness that led to him sacrificing himself for me. I question why he would push me out of the way of sure death. What made me so special? Then I realize that was what he was, the fun loving, clumsy prankster who loved his friends more than himself. Why would whatever divine being who rules the heavens see it fit to put out such a light and leave such a mess up?

It is not just this day that I remember my best friend, my team that I lost, but every day. He gave me a gift, a curse, something I will always treasure and despise for its constant reminder. I can't look in the mirror without seeing what I have lost, and remembering what was given up for me. It is this memory that keeps me fighting, that makes sure I wake up in the morning. It would dishonor his memory if I were to give up the life he gave his for.

To further honor him, his legacy, I have looked to make myself more like him. I am late in his honor; I go to the memorial stone in his memory. I have lost more friends and family then I would have ever thought possible but it is his ghost that haunts me. His memory I cannot forget.

The fates have seen it fit to give me another reminder of him, my team. They are so much like the team I use to be a part of. Sakura, so much like Rin use to be, and Sasuke, much like myself. I can't help but feel like he is destined for the same path that I traveled, or maybe something much more sinister. Naruto is like a constant reminder of what I have lost. I feel like I should be able to look at him and see him for the person he is rather than the memory he embodies, but I cannot separate the two in my mind.

I feel l was given a chance to redeem myself with this group of misfits. I was given the opportunity to right some of the wrongs I have made in my life. I am uncertain if I will be able to stop my team from making the same mistakes I have made, to save them from the fate that befell those dearest to me.

I wake at night screaming the names of those I have lost, watching as they shatter one after the other. In my head they scoff at me, disgusted by the fact that I am still breathing when their lives were cut so short. In my head I watch them as they are destroyed over and over again, and I watch myself as I cause their destruction. I deserve the reminder, the pain that these images bring. I will suffer through them because it is the least I deserve for destroying them, him.

I will remain, attempting to redeem myself. I will suffer through the memories, and reminders. I will never give into the pressure and overwhelming remorse, because I know he would never give in. He would stand strong and endure. He would always look at things cast in sunlight rather than shadow. I will try to stay strong. I will pick up the pieces their memories have left me in and I will celebrate the lives they were able to live. I will keep living for them, for him, for my best friend, for Obito.


End file.
